Nomad Podcast

It’s week three of our four-part Advent Devotional series. This time philosopher and theologian Elaine Storkey considers how Advent might be Good News to the Poor. Former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams continues to work his way through the Advent readings, with the help of Kate Blower. And David Benjamin Blower continues to bring the music and songs. So […]

Here’s the second part of our four-part Advent Devotional series. This time philosopher and theologian Elaine Storkey bases her reflection around the idea of Peace Across Borders. Former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams again brings the readings along with Kate Blower, and David Benjamin Blower brings the music and songs. Images provided by SPCK and Magdalene College. Used with […]

If you’re one of our Patreon or PayPal supporters, then you’ll already be familiar with our Nomad Devotionals. Every month we ask a guest to reflect on a topic, and then we unpack it with music, song, readings, and prayers. For Advent we thought we produce a four-part Devotional and make it available to everyone. So for […]

Dave Randall has played guitar for some huge acts, including Faithless, Dido and Sinead O’Connor. As he’s reflected on his career and the industry he’s been a part of, he has begun to see the huge potential of music to change society. This prompted him to write the excellent book Sound System: The Political Power of Music. So if you’re interested in pondering […]

Muhanad Al Qaisy’s grandfather, grandmother and seven children fled their home in Palestine and ended up in a refugee camp in 1948. Nearly 70 years later, the family is still struggling to make a life in the same camp. So we ask Muhanad what he sees as signs of hope. Interview starts at 11m 10s […]

Well, this is it, Dave Ward’s final episode. After six years of podcasting, he’s decided to go on to other things (probably something to do with horses…). In his final episode, we’re chatting with Nick Spencer, the Director of Research at Theos Think Tank, and author of The Evolution of the West: How Christianity Has […]

A recent report into human trafficking revealed that the problem is significantly worse than previously thought. In fact, it is believed that in the UK alone, every large town and city will have trafficked people in it who are effectively enslaved, and many of us are unwittingly coming into contact with trafficked people every day. […]

Elizabeth Edman believes she has learnt more from the LGBTQ community about what it means to be a Christian, than she has from the Church. Why? Well, she believes the church has forgotten what it means to be scandalous, to struggle for identity and to expand its boundaries to include the marginalised. And so the Church needs to learn from the gay […]

Malcolm Guite is a poet, priest and theologian. Years of inhabiting these roles has led him to the belief that we’re relying far too much on reason and thought in the formation of our faith, and are overlooking the significance of the ‘poetic imagination’. He believes that we can find deep truth in the imagination and that poetry can bring our […]

I know, we only just interviewed Walter Brueggemann! But he’s just brought a book out entitled Money and Possessions and we’ve still got unresolved questions after our chat with Justin Welby on that subject. So why not spend another hour in the digital presence of one of the great biblical scholars of our time?! And as you’d expect, it was an hour chock-full of wisdom and […]

Walter Brueggemann is widely considered to be one of the most influential theologians of our time. So who better to help us get a handle on the idea of the Sabbath. Especially as he wrote the fascinating and insightful Sabbath as Resistance. That’s right, Sabbath is so much more than simply taking a day off, […]

For the last 20 years Shane Claiborne has been trying to follow Jesus in a deprived area of Philadelphia. This journey has led him to a commitment to non-violence, ‘from womb to tomb’, which has been tested on many occasions. So tune in for a challenging and counter-cultural conversation. Interview starts at 11m 15s. Image […]

It’s pretty clear what Jesus was about. Love you neighbour (and if that’s not challenging enough, love your enemies) was at the top of his manifesto. So why do we find it so hard to follow his example? Professor of Psychology at Abilene University, Richard Beck, doesn’t think the issue is a lack of understanding. We know what we’re meant to […]

In many ways Brian Zahnd is like many of Nomad’s guests in that he deconstructed (although he doesn’t like that term) what he came to see as a very narrow faith, and reconstructed something much deeper and broader. The difference with Brian, though, is that he went through this process while pastoring a mega-church. So we […]

Every now and then we like to interview a fellow podcaster who, like us, is creating a space for an open and honest exploration of the Christian faith. And Justin Brierley is one such person. For over a decade he’s been producing Unbelievable?, on which he moderates conversations between Christians and people from other faiths […]

In many ways, Nomad has been quite an intellectual journey. And as much as we love some good old fashioned theological cut-and-thrust, we’ve increasingly aware that if this journey is going to be sustainable, it’s got to be an holistic one. So each month we’ll be producing Nomad Devotionals, through which we’ll be experimenting with readings, prayers, liturgies and songs. […]

What actually is prayer? What happens when we do it? What difference can it make, if any, to the events and circumstances we find ourselves in? Should we expect to sense God in prayer, or perhaps even hear him communicate to us? And if so, why do so few of us ever seem to have […]

Greg Boyd is back on the show! This time he’s tackling the thorny issue of violence in the Old Testament. How is it, for example, that the God revealed in Jesus loves his enemies and lays down his life for them, when the God we see in the Old Testament seems to routinely kill his enemies? What […]

This podcast comes to you from Nomad’s first offline Gathering. We had a great weekend of food, drink, conversation, music and meditation. We also interviewed Mark Vernon. Mark was an Anglican priest but developed deep doubts about the faith. His subsequent journey took him through atheism, to agnosticism, through ancient Greek philosophy, to a Christian […]

We recently invited the beloved listener to Nottingham for Nomad’s first offline get-together. It was a splendid weekend of conversation, interviews, music, food and drink. And we recorded some of it for you. First up is a Q&A we did on the Friday night, where David Benjamin Blower asked us about the Nomad story and […]